Abstract:

Creates awareness and knowledge of industrial relations issues across the spectrum of participants in the educational process, and can be seen as a guideline for all the relevant participants on how to cope with and how to manage industrial relations to such an extent that the relationships between employers and employees can benefit from it. This research reflects a view of industrial relations that is based on what amounts to an ideological assumption, namely that in South Africa, collective bargaining is at present the generally accepted statutory procedure for managing the relationship between employers and employees. In South Africa, the education profession is not seriously enough involved in the debate as to how education should respond to change. A strong case can be made that teacher unions, preoccupied with "bread and butter" issues, have been bought off with reasonable, inflation-adjusted salary increases in exchange for not getting involved in the structure, philosophy or direction of educaional change. Teachers are the principal agents in making an education system succeed or fail. In industrial relations, it is necessary to identify the parties and the roles adopted by each and to discover how and why they interact. In education, the mode of interaction will largely be determined by the interactive effect of custom and tradition, legal determination, mutual agreement, societal influences and ethical consideration. It is concluded that effective management of industrial relations in the education system is an absolute must. Recommendations are made.